Without LeBron playing, it'll be a competitive game. At the very least, the rising stars I think will play hard.

Still just a layup line to the basket

They need to make the payout like two million a player instead of 50k or whatever it is. Put some real scratch on the line.

And launch Kevin hart into the sun.

I knew this, but my goodness Kevin Hart is tiny.

Jokic was so disappointed in Victor Wembanyama LMFAOOOOO

Jokic: “You really brought a book?”

Wemby: “Yeah, I read before every game”

Jokic: 🤦🏼

pic.twitter.com/dUaBcVlut7

— Hater Report (@HaterReport_) February 16, 2025

Three games to 40 and we are going on two and a half hours and the last game is 1/3 of the way through

These chumps don't even deserve to be in the all star game. **** the nba. I hope they were able to get all of their advertising $$$ tonight. I don't even know what I just watched.

I'll never watch another all star game like this. Had to put the boy to bed before final even started. If they are going to continue to run out this ad fest with a few minutes of basketball spread over three hours will just dvr it and watch the next day.

TNT stretched out their coverage the entire 3 hour window. Went off the air right at 10pm. I think Ernie towards the end knew this was a terrible production.

Actual gameplay was kinda entertaining

I didn't watch, but it sounds like I didn't miss much. Maybe it's time to follow the NHL's lead and get rid of the All-Star game. The league could still name an "All-Star" team for the sake of recognition and contract incentives, but there would be no All-Star game. Instead, they could just move the NBA Cup championship week to February to replace the All-Star game week. Since there still has to be a day or two between the semi-finals and finals, the league can still do a three-point contest, dunk contest, celebrity game, etc. It would still be a fun week, but the games played would actually have some value.

Dan Scott said:

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TNT stretched out their coverage the entire 3 hour window. Went off the air right at 10pm. I think Ernie towards the end knew this was a terrible production.

Actual gameplay was kinda entertaining

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Ernie even explicitly said, 'we gotta keep our sponsors happy.' at the end. I thought the game play was awful. If there's no defense, it's not worth watching. I think the format could work, but you need to show more basketball.

txagman1998 said:

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I didn't watch, but it sounds like I didn't miss much. Maybe it's time to follow the NHL's lead and get rid of the All-Star game. The league could still name an "All-Star" team for the sake of recognition and contract incentives, but there would be no All-Star game. Instead, they could just move the NBA Cup championship week to February to replace the All-Star game week. Since there still has to be a day or two between the semi-finals and finals, the league can still do a three-point contest, dunk contest, celebrity game, etc. It would still be a fun week, but the games played would actually have some value.

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This is my stance. Just keep all nba and end of season awards and make the in season tournament more comprehensive and motivating for players. At the end of the day, the all star game is just a 60% of the season award. Some players are injured. There are reserves. There are legacy spots. Legacy votes. It's become meaningless.

On a brighter note, I cashed my Steph Curry All Star MVP ticket. No way he wouldn't win it in the bay

CFTXAG10 said:

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On a brighter note, I cashed my Steph Curry All Star MVP ticket. No way he wouldn't win it in the bay

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Good call! What were the odds?

I rarely, if ever watch the NBA, but I briefly flipped it on last night when I saw it on the channel guide. It was probably around 8:15 so I assumed the game would be on. Instead it was Kevin Hart, and Shaq talking with Steph for what seemed like 10 minutes. I tuned in for basketball and gave it a shot, however zero basketball was shown. So stupid. And after reading multiple articles this morning, as well as this thread it seems like I am not the only one with the same feelings.

The NBA ratings will continue to decline until the players start playing defense again like they did back in the day. It is so damn boring. Five guys on the court with one dribbling while the other four on offense all stand outside the 3 point line motionless. It is complete garbage what it has become.

What a sad state of affairs when we're relying on a Frenchman to out compete our home grown athletes.

The French of all people!

Guitarsoup said:

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CFTXAG10 said:

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On a brighter note, I cashed my Steph Curry All Star MVP ticket. No way he wouldn't win it in the bay

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Good call! What were the odds?

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+600

Just a small bet. Had $18.28 in free play cashed for $109.68

AustinCountyAg said:

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I rarely, if ever watch the NBA, but I briefly flipped it on last night when I saw it on the channel guide. It was probably around 8:15 so I assumed the game would be on. Instead it was Kevin Hart, and Shaq talking with Steph for what seemed like 10 minutes. I tuned in for basketball and gave it a shot, however zero basketball was shown. So stupid. And after reading multiple articles this morning, as well as this thread it seems like I am not the only one with the same feelings.

The NBA ratings will continue to decline until the players start playing defense again like they did back in the day. It is so damn boring. Five guys on the court with one dribbling while the other four on offense all stand outside the 3 point line motionless. It is complete garbage what it has become.

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Guys haven't played defense in the All-Star game since Jordan was a rookie 40 years ago. Not sure why you thought you were going to see any serious basketball during the All-Star game. Maybe try The Finals?

CFTXAG10 said:

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Guitarsoup said:

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CFTXAG10 said:

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On a brighter note, I cashed my Steph Curry All Star MVP ticket. No way he wouldn't win it in the bay

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Good call! What were the odds?

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+600

Just a small bet. Had $18.28 in free play cashed for $109.68

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Money is money. Very nice bet and good reasoning behind it. Plus steph's shooting ability is pretty tailor made for the ASG DGAF shot chucking.

Yea. They let him put on a show. It was actually the A-Team on 790 talking about it that put me onto the bet. They called it that they would let him run the show in his city

I actually kind of liked the format, with the 8 man teams and games to 40, but there were so many breaks and so much Kevin Hart that it was really tough to hang in with it.

I meant defense in ANY NBA game during the season.

I feel like there are so many ways they could tinker with it to make these guys compete.

Imagine if they played two games at a time or something, and the fans could live vote which one they wanted to watch and who to give airtime to - if you're a "superstar", imagine the fans saying "Nah, we don't want to see Lebron, he's loafing in his game, let me tune in to the young guys".

These guys still have egos and brands to protect - they just have to figure out a better way to leverage that.

CC09LawAg said:

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I feel like there are so many ways they could tinker with it to make these guys compete.

Imagine if they played two games at a time or something, and the fans could live vote which one they wanted to watch and who to give airtime to - if you're a "superstar", imagine the fans saying "Nah, we don't want to see Lebron, he's loafing in his game, let me tune in to the young guys".

These guys still have egos and brands to protect - they just have to figure out a better way to leverage that.

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Women's players just completed their first ever one-on-one tournament in the Unrivaled League with the winner taking home $200,000. The winner Napheesa Collier, has a yearly WBNA salary of $214,000, she basically doubled her yearly income in about 3 hours.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/wnba/2025/02/14/unrivaled-1-on-1-tournament-finals-how-to-watch-on-tv-live-stream/78598896007/

Clearly the NBA players would need something way above $200K to make even moderate stars come out. The winning 8 on Sunday night got $125,000 each; second got $50K, and third and fourth got $25K. That's 32 guys splitting $1.8 million. Bump it up to $2 million flat. A 1-on-1 champion gets $1.5 million that day. The runner-up gets $400,000 and the guy who finishes third gets $100,000.
They should also incentivize it with something really unique and exclusive - something one of a kind that players will covet. Like a car that there's only one of or access to some sort of vacation property that you can't buy/rent otherwise. LIke some private island you get exclusive access to for a year.

Once LeBron retires the competitive part will come out. He's the leader of the players and sets the tone. He tells them to go easy and thus they go easy. I really think that's a big part of it.

What he Lebron did yesterday really showed he doesn't care.

Imagine the winner of a 1 on 1 tourney getting their team extra lottery balls or something - even if it's a 2% chance or something small - the first time one of those got a mid 30s superstar who hasn't picked in the lottery in a decade a top 3 pick, people would go nuts.

And fans of the team would absolutely roast their superstar for coasting when they know it is potentially costing them a shot at another franchise player.

ETA: Heck, you could do the same thing for the 3 point contest, the dunk contest...make these superstars have to answer to the fans for not participating in this stuff.

"Hey, super awesome dunking superstar - why aren't you competing and giving your franchise a chance to draft Flagg this year?"

"Oh, well, I don't want to embarrass myself."

*crickets*

I'm not convinced you can unring the bell on the effort issue. And honestly, as a Spurs fan, I'd be really upset if Wemby suffered an injury diving for a loose ball in an exhibition game, so I kind of get it.

CC09LawAg said:

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Imagine the winner of a 1 on 1 tourney getting their team extra lottery balls or something - even if it's a 2% chance or something small - the first time one of those got a mid 30s superstar who hasn't picked in the lottery in a decade a top 3 pick, people would go nuts.

And fans of the team would absolutely roast their superstar for coasting when they know it is potentially costing them a shot at another franchise player.

ETA: Heck, you could do the same thing for the 3 point contest, the dunk contest...make these superstars have to answer to the fans for not participating in this stuff.

"Hey, super awesome dunking superstar - why aren't you competing and giving your franchise a chance to draft Flagg this year?"

"Oh, well, I don't want to embarrass myself."

*crickets*

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I tell you what you do, you make the 1 on 1 tournament have a grand prize of 50% of winning player's salary up to say $20 million for that year matched by the league. Have everything but the last couple of rounds be on Pay Per View if you want to clean up on revenue to pay for the prize.

64-man field, first one to 10 wins - three-pointers count for 2, everything else is 1. Other than the Curry / LeBron / Durants of the world, who isn't going to out there to try and add $20 million to their income for the year?

Or, you guilt trip the **** out of them and tell them it's $10 million for them and $10 million for their favorite charity.

64-man field? LMAO. Needs to be an 8-man field max. 1:1 is obviously completely different than 5:5 and anyone who has played organized ball will tell you that the winner is usually the person who can post and/or has a height advantage and/or has touch around the rim, would dominate this tourney. Speed is not a factor in 1:1.

Basically, prime DeMarcus Cousins would have been the GOAT 1:1 player had there been a tourney while he was playing. Either way, entertaining to watch.

That Kyrie/Wemby clip would work in a game to 10. Wemby would wash him.

64-man field. Wipe out all the horse**** activities other than dunks and 3 point shootouts.

4 brackets of 16 guys each. Everybody plays once on Friday night to cut the field to 32

Saturday at 12 pm cuts the field to 16`

Saturday at 4 pm cuts the field to 8

Saturday at 8 pm cuts the field to 4

Sunday at 2 pm cuts the field to 2

Champs go head to head Sunday in prime time.